1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a sheet bundle conveying apparatus which conveys sheets fed from an image forming apparatus or the like to the downstream side after the sheets are stacked into a bundle shape and a post-processing is performed thereon, and relates to improvement of a conveying mechanism to discharge the sheet bundle along a tray face.
2. Description of Related Arts
In general, as a post-processing apparatus, there has been widely known an apparatus which performs a binding process with a binding unit after stacking, on a processing tray, sheets fed from an image forming apparatus and stores the sheets on a stack tray at the downstream side. As a structure thereof, there has been known a structure (stand-alone structure) that a sheet introducing path is connected to a sheet discharging port of an image forming apparatus, image-formed sheets are collated and stacked on a processing tray arranged at the sheet discharging port, and the sheets are stored in a stack tray arranged at the downstream side after a binding process is performed thereon with a binding unit arranged at the processing tray. Further, there has been known a structure (inner finisher structure) that a unit which includes a processing tray provided with a binding device and a stack tray are incorporated in a sheet discharging area of an image forming apparatus.
Such an apparatus requires a bundle conveying mechanism which conveys a sheet bundle bound at the processing tray to the stack tray at the downstream side. For example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2011-246283 (FIG. 2) discloses a post-processing apparatus in which sheets with images formed at an image forming apparatus are bound after being collated and stacked, and then, stored in a stack tray. Here, there is provided a sheet bundle conveying mechanism at a processing tray to convey a sheet bundle from a binding position to the stack tray at the downstream side. In the mechanism, a pawl member (projection member, as the case may be) which is engaged with a tailing end edge of a sheet bundle is integrally arranged with a belt supported by a drive pulley, and the pawl member is moved along a tray face from a binding end section of the processing tray to a discharging end section.
Further, according to a mechanism disclosed in Japanese Patent Application Laid-open No. 2011-190021 (FIG. 2), a binding process is performed on a collated and stacked sheet bundle with a binding device arranged at a processing tray which is arranged at the downstream side of an image forming apparatus and the sheet bundle is discharged to a stack tray at the downstream side with a pair of rollers arranged at the processing tray.